Media Statements

A lawsuit was filed on October 29th against St. Joseph High School, the Diocese of Ft. Wayne-South Bend, school administrators, and a former athletic coach. The three young women who are the plaintiffs in the case graduated from St. Joseph High school in 2018 and 2019. The complaint accuses former volleyball coach Justin Cochran of "sexual and inappropriate interactions and correspondence." The administrators named in the suit are cited for failing to appropriately respond to the girls’ outcries at the time of the misconduct.

The court filing describes in graphic detail the harm these brave girls suffered in high school both from the actions of Coach Cochran and from the inaction of school administrators.  We loudly applaud the three young women for coming forward now and taking steps to lay the responsibility for their damages back where it belongs, at the feet of the accused, the administrators, and the Diocese responsible for monitoring the high school. We are so impressed by the girls' efforts to call adult attention to the problem while they were still in high school, despite persistent harassment and bullying. While it is never a cause for celebration to learn of sexual abuse in any form, we are very grateful to know that the young women's families supported them, and we want the girls to know that we stand with them as well.

Fr. James Jackson was charged on Saturday, October 30, with possessing and transferring child pornography. A Rhode Island State Police task force, Internet Crimes Against Children, executed a search warrant at St. Mary’s on Broadway, in Providence. Both the church and rectory were included in the warrant. State Police said that as part of a child pornography investigation, they discovered that the internet connection at the rectory at the parish was involved. Task Force members determined that Father Jackson was the owner of that media. The priest was arraigned by a Justice of the Peace and held after he failed to post bail.

By our count, Fr. Jackson is the 20^th Catholic cleric or staffer arrested this year on criminal charges related to sexual abuse. We are seeing an average of two arrests per month. More importantly, SNAP statistics also reveal that there have been 350 clergy and laypersons charged with abuse since 2004. It certainly seems that a week does not go by without some disturbing news of offending Catholic clergy, brothers, nuns, or laity does not appear in our news feeds.

We applaud the work done so far by the Office of Attorney General Josh Kaul. The investigation of clergy sexual abuse in Wisconsin was launched in April 2021. An interim report was issued yesterday by AG Kaul which revealed nearly 180 reports of abuse by leaders from multiple religious organizations and faith traditions. The agency also noted that it received reports from every Roman Catholic diocese in Wisconsin and that those who filed reports were between 18 and 75 years of age.

We are particularly encouraged to read that accusations of clergy sexual abuse were fielded by the AG's office from victims who are still minors. While the average age for a survivor to come forward is 52 when outcries are made by children and young adults, there is a greater chance for criminal prosecution of the perpetrators, and perhaps even of those who hid and enabled these criminals.

President Joseph Biden, the second Catholic president in U.S. history, is slated to visit with Pope Francis in Rome on October 29th.  While some may believe that the meeting is more personal than political, we believe that President Biden can and should convey a strong message to Pope Francis that he needs to do more to address the scourge of clergy sexual abuse within our country.

In the United States, we are currently seeing an average of two arrests per month of trusted figures in Catholic facilities. This disturbing news shows us that the persistent claims from Church officials that the abuse scandal is a thing of the past are simply not true. It is very much a thing of the present.

Several months after being accused of underreporting their assets, the Catholic Diocese of Camden has now boosted the amount of compensation it is offering to survivors. Put simply, church officials from Camden are vacillating between greed and dishonesty when they should be opening their hands and diocesan coffers for the victims that the diocese has created. 

Time and time again, church officials have been exposed for misusing bankruptcy court and hiding assets improperly, so we are glad that survivors in Camden are at least getting better compensation than was originally announced. At the same time, multiple different attempts have been made to determine the lifetime cost of abuse that society bears as the result of sexual abuse, and estimates show that the cost is nearly $900,000. That burden is felt by taxpayers, not wrongdoers and enablers, and as far as we are concerned, it is that latter group that should be paying for the years of therapy, medical treatments, and other life problems that were created by the abuse. The $163,000 per victim the diocese claims to be offering is but a down payment on the suffering already endured.

Fr. Gregory Loughney was arrested on October 22, 2021, on charges that he contacted and arranged to meet with what he thought was a 15 year old boy using the online dating app Tinder. The Catholic clergyman was arraigned the following day. While we are grateful that law enforcement conducted this sting and have charged Fr. Loughney, we are concerned that he may have also assaulted real children, and that there may even be victims in the parishes where he worked. We feel it is incumbent upon the Diocese of Scranton to announce this arrest in every place that Fr. Loughney was assigned either as a cleric or a seminarian, and to beg anyone who may have experienced, witnessed, or suspected abuse to contact law enforcement. 

Today, Attorney General Josh Shapiro announced that Fr. Andrew Kawecki pleaded no contest to sexually assaulting an altar boy in 2004. The victim was 11 years old at the time and the abuse continued until the boy was 14. The priest used his position of power to abuse within his parish at St. Cyril and Methodius Church in Fairchance, Pennsylvania. 

Despite consistent rhetoric from Church officials that the sexual abuse scandal is a thing of the past, by our count an average of two Catholic clerics or staffers are charged each month with crimes against children or targeted adults. In Pennsylvania, Fr. Kawecki was identified following the release of the Grand Jury on Clergy Sexual Abuse in 2018 and was charged in August 2020. To date, the Office of Attorney General in Pennsylvania (OAG) has fielded over 2,000 tips regarding clergy and institutional abuse, and it was information received through this hotline that led to Fr. Kawecki's prosecution. This case shows the importance of secular investigations that provide opportunities for survivors to tell their stories and listen, hear, and act in response to those outcries.

The trial of Fr. Geoff Drew, a Cincinnati priest, has been delayed for a fourth time according to his defense attorney. The trial was set to begin Monday, October 25^th. The priest, 59, has been housed at the Hamilton County Justice Center in lieu of a $5 million bond and could face life in prison if convicted. According to a report by Fox-19 news, the latest delay is at the request of Hamilton County prosecutors and a new item on the court docket shows the hearing still scheduled for Monday as a ‘plea or trial setting.’

In August 2019, less than a month after being placed on leave, the Cincinnati-area Fr. Drew was indicted on nine counts of rape. The clergyman, who was the former head of St. Ignatius Loyola Parish, is accused of abusing a young boy while he was employed as the Music Minister at St. Jude School in Cincinnati. Our hearts ache for the victim in this case and we hope that he is not discouraged by this recent news.

The Catholic Diocese of Lincoln in Nebraska will be reassigning two priests who were the subjects of investigations into sexual misconduct. According to the statements released by the Diocese, both Fr. Scott Courtney and Fr. Thomas Dunavan will now have limitations in place in their new postings. We remain concerned about the safety of parishioners and the public.

Fr. Courtney had been placed on leave in September 2018. A woman accused the clergyman of sexual misconduct during an August meeting with the Diocesan council. She also reported the incident to the police. Fr. Dunavan was accused of "sexual misconduct/grooming" of either a child or a young adult and was removed from ministry in 2019. That allegation was also reported to law enforcement.

The state of Maine is now safer for children because of a law that went into effect on October 18, 2021, that will help expose dangerous child predators. Adults of all ages who were abused as children will now be able to file lawsuits for child sex abuse, even if their claim was expired under the prior law. This change opens the courthouse doors to victims who, until now, were denied justice. It also means that at least some child molesters - and any colleagues or supervisors who helped them hide their crimes - can no longer hide from the eyes of the public.

We understand that no amount of money can make up for a lost childhood. But when survivors are allowed to use the tried-and-true civil justice system to name their abusers, obtain secret records, exposing cover-ups, and provide valuable evidence to law enforcement, today's children are safer, and victims can begin to heal. Similar laws in California, New York, New Jersey, and Delaware have helped to publicize the names of hundreds of perpetrators, and thousands of pages of evidence of abuse have exposed cover-ups and in some cases even led to criminal prosecutions.